Your Excellency Foreign Minister Hugh Todd,

I appreciate Guyana for its initiative to hold this open debate on the theme of poverty, underdevelopment and conflict: implications for the maintenance of international peace and security. I welcome Your Excellency to New York to preside over this meeting. I thank Secretary-General António  Guterres, Assistant Secretary-General Kanni Wignaraja, and Chairperson Mahmoud Ali Youssouf for their briefings. 

Being the common aspiration of people of all countries, peace and development are closely interlinked and complement and reinforce each other. Poverty and underdevelopment are major root causes of conflict. Many hotspot issues remain long unresolved and require comprehensive solutions from a development perspective. To this end, I wish to share a few observations. 

We need to help developing countries leap across the development gaps. At present, progress in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is far behind expectations. Years of achievement in poverty reduction have been gained and lost. Challenges such as food and energy insecurity are interwoven. And the global development deficit is further expanding. The international community should adhere to a people-centered philosophy, work to bring development back to the center of the international agenda, put resources on a priority basis into key areas such as poverty reduction, education, employment, and capacity building, and strive to leave no country and no individual behind. 

We need to respect the development path independently chosen by every country. Countries differ in their histories, cultures, social systems, and levels of socioeconomic development. We need to respect the right of people of all countries to independently choose their development paths, and oppose foreign interference and the imposition of one’s own will onto others. We need to uphold the international rule of law, ensure effective implementation of international law, and oppose double standards. On hotspot issues, we should respect the merits of the matter, uphold fairness and justice, and support countries in the region in finding ways to defuse tensions and conflict, instead of provoking tensions and creating confrontation. 

We need to expand global partnerships for development. Developed countries should earnestly fulfill their ODA commitments and step up financial and technical support for developing countries, in particular, vulnerable countries, so as to fulfill the role of North-South cooperation as the main channel. Developing countries need to actively engage in South-South cooperation and achieve strength through unity. China supports the UN in playing a central, coordinating role in international development cooperation, and encourages UN agencies and relevant international organizations to leverage their own strengths, step up complementarity and coordination, and form synergies for development. 

We need to work to improve global governance. We need to follow the principles of extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits, jointly respond to global challenges, and promote the common development of all countries. We need to advance reform of the international financial architecture to better reflect the changes in the world economic landscape and to increase the representation and voice of developing countries. Countries should advocate universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization, jointly uphold the WTO-centered and rules-based multilateral trading system, build an open world economy, and oppose unilateralism, protectionism, and the acts of putting one’s own interest above the interests of others.

We need to attach importance to peacebuilding. In post-conflict countries, peacebuilding is a key aspect of conflict prevention. The international community needs to support the national governments in playing a leading role, and help the countries concerned improve their governance systems, enhance governance capabilities, promote inclusive development, and advance reconstruction in all sectors, so that the people will enjoy the development dividends at an early date, and the outcomes of peace will be consolidated. China will participate constructively in this year’s UN peacebuilding architecture review and promote a better role of the peacebuilding architecture. 

President, 

China has always been a builder of world peace, a contributor to global development, and a defender of the international order. We put forth the Global Security Initiative, advocating the vision for common, comprehensive, cooperative, and sustainable security and offering China’s solution for the political settlement of hotspot issues. We are actively engaged in the global development cause, working to implement the Global Development Initiative and engaging in high-quality Belt and Road cooperation with all countries for the common development of all. We are committed to high-standard opening up. We have fully opened the manufacturing sector to foreign investors and extended zero-tariff treatment to all African countries and LDCs that have established diplomatic ties with us. 

China is endeavoring to build itself into a stronger country and rejuvenate the Chinese nation on all fronts by pursuing Chinese modernization. China has successfully blazed a modernization path suited to its national conditions. With our success, we have given other developing countries greater confidence in pursuing modernization, and brought extensive opportunities for the modernization of all countries in the world. We stand ready to work with the international community in our tireless efforts to build a world of peaceful development, mutually beneficial cooperation, and common prosperity. 

I thank you, President.